Meet Cute by Helena Hunting

Talk about an embarrassing introduction. On her first day of law school, Kailyn ran – quite literally – into the actor she crushed on as a teenager, ending with him sprawled on top of her. Mortified to discover the Daxton Hughes was also a student in her class, her embarrassment over their meet-cute quickly turned into a friendship she never expected. Of course, she never saw his betrayal coming either… Now, eight years later, Dax is in her office asking for legal advice. Despite her anger, Kailyn can’t help feeling sorry for the devastated man who just became sole guardian to his thirteen-year-old sister. But when her boss gets wind of Kailyn’s new celebrity client, there’s even more at stake than Dax’s custody issues: if she gets Dax to work at their firm, she’ll be promoted to partner. The more time Kailyn spends with Dax and his sister, the more she starts to feel like a family, and the more she realizes the chemistry they had all those years ago is as fresh as ever. But will they be able to forgive the mistakes of the past, or will one betrayal lead to another?

After a law school experience, steeped in sexual tension, ends with being backstabbed. Two people are forced to coexist while trying to do what’s best in a custody agreement.

4 out of 5 steam level

This book starts off laugh out loud funny. I was laughing, cringe reading (lots of embarrassment) and smile reading throughout the first few chapters of this book. Here’s a little snippet of funny exchanges:

“I don’t have time to shave regularly these days, let alone time for hot dates.” She sighs. “I hate this whole online generation crap. Why can’t I just meet a nice guy in a coffee shop, or the library or something?”“I think you’d have to frequent coffee shops and library for that to happen, wouldn’t you?” I ask.

But don’t let the humor fool you. This book isn’t entirely funny. In fact, in the first 4 chapters- it starts to get pretty serious. The overall plot of this book revolves around a custody dispute. The writing, even when it wasn’t funny, still packed a good punch. I included a snippet of this too (you’re welcome):

“Heartache is the worst affliction. It robs a person of rationality, or logic, of forethought and patience. It makes everything good painfully bright and magnifies the bad with an intensity that’s difficult to tolerate.”

Another thing in the pro column for me is their jobs. The two main characters were both lawyers. You got to see them in law school and then see them practicing different types of law. I really enjoyed that whole aspect of the book.
The last chapter of the book was great so it definitely ended on a high note for me. It felt a little disjointed from being laugh out loud funny to being heavy and not very funny at all. But overall I enjoyed reading this and read it quickly!

Okay, you know how I feel about names. The main characters name was Daxton. You read that correctly. DAXTON. The whole book, I kept thinking… how does that name even dawn on you to use? I’ve never even heard of that name before! It did have a saving grace though because towards the latter end of the book we get to experience this funny exchange:

“Oh my God, Emme, look, Liam is waiting for you! Who’s with him? Oh! Oh! That’s Clark and Jackson and River.”“Who the hell named these kids?” I mutter.“Your name is Daxton,” Emme points out.

Another thing I didn’t love was how predictable this book was. I knew exactly what was going on in all of the plotlines- and in fact, ended up being a little annoyed that it took the characters so long to catch on. It got to be a little bit stressful at times!
Speaking of stressful- when these characters get together it seems ethically unsound. So I was pretty stressed throughout the book waiting for the shoe to drop on that part of the plot.
I think my biggest gripe was that this was titled Meet Cute and it’s not a cutesy book- but more of a heavy hitter.